The Happiest Place on Earth?
by hxchick
Summary: Dave and Penelope enjoy a day at Disneyland...well one of them enjoys it. Multi-Chapter. Written for the Pick Your Own Pairing Challenge at the Chit Chat on Author's Corner forum.
1. Chapter 1

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

The Crappiest Place on Earth-Chapter 1

* * *

As he stepped into his hotel room, David Rossi was greeted by the sound of his wife throwing up in the bathroom. Swallowing hard and willing his own breakfast to stay in place, he set down the tea and toast he'd gotten for her and knocked on the bathroom door.

"You okay in there, honey?" He asked, hoping she wouldn't want him to come in. Dave could deal with serial killers, dead bodies and some of the worst depravement of humanity, but he could not deal with someone being sick…he was what Morgan called a 'sympathetic puker.' Hell, he could barely deal with his own son vomiting and he was only two years old! Thankfully for him, his loving wife remembered his aversion to illness and called out, "No, I'm fine David, just give me a minute."

Sighing in relief, Dave set her light breakfast up on the small table. He had just finished when she stepped out of the bathroom. Looking shaky and green, she wobbled into the room.

"What is THAT?" She asked, eyeing the food on the table.

"That's your breakfast, Jen." Seeing her shake his head, he pushed on, "You have to eat something honey, even if it _is_ just tea and toast."

"Dave, at this point I'm not eating food, I'm renting it. If I eat any of that, I can guarantee I'll just be seeing it ten minutes later in the toilet."

Feeling his own gag reflex kick in at her description, he cleared his throat. "Fine, but I expect to see it gone by the time I get back."

JJ nodded agreeably, he hadn't said _how_ she should get rid of it, only that it needed to be gone. Fine, she would dump it in the trash at the end of the hallway.

Remembering that he would be leaving shortly, Dave frowned. "Are you _sure_ you don't want me to stay here and take care of you?"

His wife shook her head and instantly regretted it as the movement only intensified the nausea, "I'll be fine here," she said firmly. "You're going on this outing, David."

"But Jen," he whined, "Disneyland? With Penelope Garcia? If San Francisco is her Mecca, then Disneyland _has _to be her version of heaven!"

"I know, that's why she needs someone to go with her, if only to make sure she leaves at the end of the day," JJ explained. "I don't think our Unit Chief would be amused if he had to bail our Technical Analyst out of Disney jail tonight, do you?"

"After my excursion with her in San Francisco, I swore," he continued to whine, "I fucking _swore_ on a bottle of Johnnie Walker Blue that I would _never _go on a trip alone with her again, especially not to a place of her choosing!"

"Well what do you want me to do, Dave? Do you want me to drag my food poisoned ass out to the happiest place on earth just so you don't have to? Is that what you want me to do? Is that really what you're asking the mother of your future children to do?" As a mother, JJ could pull a guilt trip like no one else and it worked on her husband.

"Of course not, I just don't want to fucking do this!"

"Would you rather be puking up your guts like the rest of the team? You should consider yourself lucky that you're not sick!" She told him.

"That's 'cause I wasn't dumb enough t have 'all you can eat sushi' last night," he mumbled.

The team had been called to Anaheim to investigate a serial arsonist and had been stuck in Southern California for over a week. They'd finally apprehended the unsub the previous morning and had finished the paperwork for everything by the previous evening. To thank them, a couple of the local detectives had taken the team to a local tavern for dinner and drinks. Seeing the 'all you can eat sushi' on the menu, the entire team except for himself, Garcia and Reid had decided to try it. That had been a mistake of epic proportions, since all of them became violently ill during the night and had to make trips to the emergency room. The ER doc had diagnosed them all as having food poisoning and had advised them to extend their trip to the Golden State by another couple of days.

Dave hadn't been happy upon hearing the advice from the doctor. He absolutely _hated _the land of fruits and nuts. He considered California to be somewhere between purgatory and hell and he'd wanted to get out of the state as fast as they could. Hell, he hadn't even wanted to come to the state in the first place. All of the experts kept saying that California was ripe for an earthquake, and he didn't want to be anywhere near the crazy place when it finally fell into the ocean.

JJ had heard her husband's mutterings and wasn't amused, "Hey, we're right on the Pacific Ocean so I thought the sushi would be fresh! How was I supposed to know it would make all of us this sick?"

"Maybe because it was being served at a BAR?" He shot back, his mood worsening as he waited for Garcia to arrive.

JJ took a calming breath, "Look Dave, if you want to bail on Penelope's first trip to Disneyland, be my guest, but I hope you like digging yourself out of a very deep electronic grave."

He sighed, "Of course I don't want to ruin-wait, did you say it's her _first_ trip to the Magic Kingdom?" He asked, praying he'd heard wrong.

"Um, did I say that?" JJ said, not meeting his eyes.

"Yeah, yeah you did Jen. So tell me, am I really escorting Penelope Garcia on her first trip to Disneyland?"

JJ knew she couldn't lie to her husband, in large part because he was a human lie detector. "Yes David, this is her first trip."

He looked at her in horror, "Are you shitting me? On a good day she's so hyper I can barely keep up with her, but my God, she'll be twenty times worse at Disneyland! Can't Reid go with her instead?" Dave asked, recalling the other member of their team who wasn't affected by the questionable fish.

"Serisously? You want _Reid_ to go with her? Do you have a death wish for the young genius?"

"What do you mean?" Rossi asked, trying to sound innocent. "I just thought the good doctor could use a day of fun."

His wife gave an unladylike snort, "Yeah, right! You _know _Penelope would kill him inside of an hour of being at the park. First he would explain the physics behind all of the rides, then he would explain why it was impossible for a mouse to talk, or for a dog to be walking upright, and _then _Penelope would stab him with some sort of Disney themed souvenir. There's no _way_ I'm sending them to the park by themselves, but if you're so concerned about Reid having a good time, why don't you invite him to go with you?"

Dave shuddered at this idea; a trip to Disneyland with both Garcia and Reid? He had no doubt that he would be the dead one coming out of that scenario, and he was fairly sure he would die by his own hand. "No, no," he said quickly, as his wife picked up her cell phone. "Garcia and I will do quite nicely on our own."

JJ smiled, "Well that's good to hear, now why don't you get ready?"

"What do you mean?" Dave asked, looking down at his outfit. He was wearing his standard tailor fit blue jeans, a button down shirt and a blazer.

"What I mean is-" JJ's explanation was interrupted by an enthusiastic knock at the door.


	2. Chapter 2

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS. I own nothing but my imagination.

The Crappiest Place on Earth-Chapter 2

**~Sorry about the wait for this one, I really didn't forget about it!**

* * *

Dave opened the door and immediately reached for his gun, as it seemed that a deranged Disney fan had made it up to their room. He stopped midway to his holster as he realized the crazy person at the door was, in fact, one Penelope Garcia.

"Sweet merciful Christ," he breathed as she barged her way into their hotel room. Garcia being…well, _Garcia,_ refused to wear anything that was mass produced. She always told people that her clothing was a reflection of her personality and because of that, her personality wouldn't let her wear anything that Chinese children had worked on for ten cents per day. As a result, her clothing was…unique in Dave's eyes and that included her Disney wardrobe.

She was wearing an electric blue t-shirt that could have been seen from space, and on it she'd puffy painted a giant Mickey Mouse head. Her red capris were the same, except they had Minnie Mouse heads painted all over them, as was evident by the bow. She wore what looked to be homemade Donald Duck earrings, and a necklace made out of small Goofy doll heads. The piece de resistance of her getup was the face paint. She had tiny Mickey Mouse heads painted on both of her cheeks and, despite himself, Dave was impressed that she was able to paint them on herself with such a steady hand.

"How's my sick little Cupcake doing this morning?" Garcia asked as she gave JJ a big hug. Dave watched as his wife turned green and he pried the overzealous tech away from her.

"Easy Penelope, you don't want JJ ruining your…interesting outfit, do you?" He asked her, praying that JJ would, in fact, ruin the outfit, forcing her to put on something that was more normal, although 'normal' to Penelope Garcia was still a freak show to the rest of the world.

Garcia jumped away from her friend like she was on fire, "God _no_! This is all homemade couture!" She paused as she ran her eyes up and down Rossi's frame. "Why aren't you dressed yet, agent Moneybags?"

He gave her a puzzled look, "What do you mean, Garcia?" He asked as he looked at his body. "I _am_ dressed. Look, I'm wearing pants and everything."

"You're dressed to catch unsubs, or to go to lunch with a colleague, you are _not _dressed to spend the day at Disneyland with a fabulous tech goddess!"

"I don't know what to tell you, Kitten, other than this is the most causal outfit I have with me, so it will have to do," he told her, thanking God that Disneyland opened at the same time as the malls did, so he wouldn't be forced to go shopping for a more 'appropriate' outfit.

"Ah, but I'm like a boy scout, Agent Rossi, I come prepared." Garcia reached into her tote bag that was shaped like a Pluto head and pulled out a folded, bright purple t-shirt. He watched horrified as she opened it up to reveal a handmade Scrooge McDuck t-shirt. The McDuck character was made from an iron-on decal and there were tiny Minnie and Mickey Mouse heads puffy painted all over the shirt. "I made this especially for you," she told him as she held the shirt up to him.

Dave tried to hide his look of horror, "Wow, thanks Garcia, but…I'm not sure that purple is my color."

"Pfft," she said, waving his concern away, "This shade looks good on anyone. Go ahead and put it on."

"Yeah, but I don't want to take one of your shirts. Why don't I just buy one when we get there? I promise I'll put it on right away," he held up three fingers in promise.

"God no!" Garcia shuddered. "If you buy one of those shirts you'll look like everyone else! What you have here is a Penelope Garcia original!"

"But-" he tried protesting, but his wife entered the fray.

"Put the shirt on Dave, you don't want to insult Garcia do you?" She asked, seeing her friend's excitement lagging.

He looked from his wife to the hyper technical goddess and sighed. He reached for the shirt and retired to the bathroom to change.

While he was changing into the brightly colored shirt, Garcia gave her friend a once-over. "Good Lord, Cupcake, you look like shit!"

"Thanks Pen," Jen said wryly. Like she didn't know she looked awful, one glance in the bathroom mirror had been enough for her that morning.

"Are you going to be okay? Do you want me to leave your hunky husband here for you? I can go to Disneyland alone, or I could stay here with you," she offered half-heartedly. The truth was, she was really looking forward to going to the theme park with the older agent. Once he'd gotten the stick out of his ass in San Francisco, he'd been a fun guy to travel with, and since they were both Disneyland virgins, she was hoping that today's outing would be just as fun.

JJ, seeing the disappointed look on her friend's face as she made her offer, shook her head, "I'll be fine here, Pen. Em's coming over in a few minutes and we're going to camp out on the bed and watch movies all day. You go with Dave and have fun. Oh, and if you can, try to get a picture of him wearing Mickey Mouse ears. I need a picture for the next BAU newsletter."

"Ha ha, very funny, wife of mine," Dave said, coming out of the bathroom. He felt like a jackass wearing the…unique t-shirt, but he didn't want to piss the two women off, so he kept it on. "How in the hell am I supposed to explain to Henry that his daddy went to Disneyland without him?"

"That's _your _problem, Agent Rossi, because there is going to be a LOT of photographic evidence from our adventure," Garcia said as she pulled out a neon pink digital camera.

At that moment there was a knock at the door and Dave went to open it. He revealed a very green looking Emily Prentiss on the other side, and as soon as she saw him in his shirt, she started laughing hysterically. Dave watched her for a minute and then quirked an eyebrow.

"Something funny, Prentiss?" He asked sardonically.

"You just…I've never seen…oh my god!" She tried catching her breath, but it got caught in more giggles.

"Hmmm, you seem to be having some trouble there, Em. Can I get you something, some water maybe? Or a nice breakfast? How about some pancakes and sausage? Or some nice raw fish?"

Emily instantly sobered up and clutched her stomach, "Ugh, no fair even _mentioning_ food, Rossi!"

"Well, no fair laughing at my shirt, and I wouldn't make fun of it in front of Garcia since she made it for me, unless you _want _to find yourself in an electronic quagmire."

"Thanks for the warning, Dave," she said as she entered the room.

Once she and JJ had settled on the bed, Garcia looked at the clock and clapped her hands, "Chop chop, Agent Rossi, the shuttle for the park leaves in ten minutes and we _are _going to be on it, unless you want to brave the traffic and parking at Disneyland."

"Hell no!" He exclaimed, shuddering at the thought. He went over to the bed and kissed his wife goodbye.

"Be good Dave, and I'll try and show you a good time tonight," JJ whispered in his ear as she wrapped her arms around him.

"Yeah, good luck with that, babe. I'll be happy if you can just keep your dinner down," he said with a gentle smile.

They pulled apart and Dave started to get up, but his wife stopped him. She reached under the back of his shirt and pulled out his service weapon. "The gun stays here Dave."

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While they were waiting for the shuttle, Garcia turned to Dave with a small paintbrush and said, "Your face needs a little decor, Agent Tall, Dark and Handsome." She reached for him with the brush and he gently caught her wrist in his hand.

"Garcia, I've never hit a woman but if you try to put face paint on me, I guarantee that will change," he warned.

Blocked from decorating the older agent's face, Penelope pouted and kicked at the ground until the shuttle arrived, and Dave had to hide a grin; she looked like she was about seven years old.

As they sat in the overcrowded bus, Dave began to dread the day ahead of him even more. If the shuttle was any indication of how the park would be, he was in for a day of hell. The bus was filled with children of various ages and very frazzled parents. He knew, of course, that he was going to a place that was geared towards kids, and he was less than happy about it. The truth was that other than his adopted son, Dave really didn't care for children. Sure, they were cute as long as they were quiet, but what were the odds that he would see any quiet children that day?

Worse than the children, he was going to the park with an adult child. Garcia was bouncing in her seat like a six year old and she was currently discussing the merits of a particular ride with an eight-year old that was sitting in front of them. God help him if she ate any sugar during their outing. With a shudder, he vowed to watch over her to make sure that _didn't _happen.

Things became worse once they actually got to Disneyland, because in order to get to the actual park area, they had to walk through 'Downtown Disney,' which was a euphemism for a shopping area.

"Oooh, look Agent Rossi, shot glasses with Mickey Mouse inside of them! Derek would _love _these," she said as she picked up a box of the colorful glasses. "And a Goofy tie, wouldn't that look great on Hotch?"

Dave was thankful that it was noisy in the shop, because it meant that Garcia didn't hear his bark of laughter as he imagined their straight-laced unit chief wearing the Disney tie.

"I'm not carrying a bunch of crap throughout the park, Garcia, so be careful of what you buy." When the shuttle driver told her that she wouldn't be able to bring her tote bag into the park, Garcia left it at the hotel. As a result, she had nothing to carry any of her planned souvenirs in.

The brightly dressed woman looked crestfallen for a moment but then perked back up, "That's okay," she said, "We can come back here after we're done in the park.!"

Christ, he was going to be subjected to this again at the end of their ordeal? Wonderful, just wonderful. They finally got through the hell that was Downtown Disney and got to the ticket booths. After waiting in line for fifteen minutes, they finally got to the front. Once there, Garcia pushed her way in front of him. "Two please," she told the person behind the counter as she reached for her wallet.

Dave sighed, pulled her away from the window and took her place, "Do you really think I'm going to let you pay for our tickets?" He growled as he slid his Visa card to the guy behind the glass.

"No, Agent Rossi, this was my idea and it's my day, so I should pay," Garcia protested.

If it had been any other member of his team, Dave would have told them to take their head out of their ass, but it was Garcia and he couldn't say that to her. Part of it was because he didn't want to rain too much on her parade, and part of it was a fear of what she would do to him, both physically and electronically.

"Garcia, my mother would rise from the grave and beat me senseless with her wooden spoon if I _ever _let a lady pay her own way. This one's on me," he told her.

"Wow…thanks Agent Rossi," Penelope said, touched by his chivalry.

"No problem, but would you _please_ call me Dave, at least for today? I don't really want the entire park knowing I'm an FBI agent, especially since I left my sidearm at the hotel with Jen." That was part of his reason for wanting her to call him Dave. The other was he was afraid that a fan would overhear her say his last name and recognize him. The absolute LAST thing he needed was for pictures of him in this getup to hit the internet, or worse, a YouTube video.

"Okay, I'll give it a try, Agent R-Dave," she corrected herself, feeling weird calling him by his first name.

"So what now?" He asked, as she opened a park map.

"Now we wait for the park to open, it opens in about five minutes," she told him as they joined the throng of people waiting to get into the park.

Five very crowded minutes later, a Mickey Mouse mascot approached the gates and the over head speakers played a welcome message in the mouse's high pitched voice. Once the greeting was done, the Mickey mascot opened the gates and the people rushed in.

Dave's final thought before he entered the child filled park was, 'Who would have imagined that the gates of hell would be opened by a talking mouse?"

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**Calling all CM readers and authors! Join us for our first Profiler's Choice CM Awards on Fanfiction. net! Help us choose the best of the best of the CM stories on ff. net, and let your voice be heard. Anyone with a ff. net account is eligible to nominate. Please check out the nominating ballot and rules at Chit Chat on Author's Forum at http:/ forum. fanfiction. net/topic/74868/30888142/1/. All rules and information are on the forum.**


	3. Chapter 3

Disclaimer: Criminal Minds is owned by CBS and Disneyland is owned by the Disney Corporation. I own nothing but my imagination.

The Crappiest Place on Earth-Chapter 3

**~Finally, an update! I didn't mean to let this one go for so long...I started it without an end in mind and I kind of lost my train of thought with it. I have an endpoint now, so it shouldn't be another 6 months before I update it again.**

**~I owe HUGE debts of gratitude to _HansonFanGermany_, _kdzl_ and _mrytale2-5_ for all of their help with this (and the next) chapter! Without these three brilliant authors, this story would've probably sat on the shelf for another 6 months. If you're not reading their stories, you should check them out because they're AWESOME!**

* * *

Two hours later, Dave was standing in a men's room trying to dry his shirt and pants under the hand dryer. Because there were small children around, he kept his mutterings as quiet as he could but he was ready to strangle someone, and that someone was Penelope Garcia.

On their way into the park, he'd told her he didn't want to go on any roller coasters and he didn't want to go on any rides that would get him wet. After nodding agreeably at him, they went and met a friend of hers who worked in computer support at Disney and then she dragged them to their first ride…which just happened to be Space Mountain. He had to admit, it was pretty cool inside the ride area; it's what he imagined the year 2010 would be when he was watching astronauts walk on the moon back in the late 60's and if the excursion had stayed that tame, he would've been fine with it. But it hadn't. Not by a long shot.

In retrospect, he should've known something was up when Garcia gave him evasive answers about the ride; after all, hadn't he seen that same behavior in many of the unsubs he'd questioned over the years? As he contorted his large frame under the hand dryer, he also admitted he could've paid attention to the long list of warnings for the ride, including the one that read 'for your safety, you should be in good health and free from high blood pressure before riding this ride," and the one that warned expectant mothers not to ride, but he'd just assumed it was the Disney Corporation covering it's ass. He'd been dead wrong on that one. The ninety-seconds that ensued, after he sat down in the cart, were some of the scariest of his life. Not only was it a giant roller coaster, it was a roller coaster that took place in almost complete darkness. There were a few times when he thought he actually would have a heart attack!

Then, as soon as he'd recovered from the horrific ordeal of the ride…actually, well _before _he'd recovered, Garcia had dragged him across half of the park in order to go on Splash Mountain. Again, he should have known by the name of the ride that he would get wet, but Garcia had pulled him up to the front of the line before he could question her about it. At least that ride had been lit, unlike Space Mountain, but all that meant was that he was able to see the cascade of water just before it hit him.

Sighing, Dave realized that short of removing his clothes and holding them under the dryer, which no doubt would have gotten him an entirely different tour of Disneyland, his clothes were going to remain damp. Thankfully it was in the seventies outside, so he wouldn't be too cold, just a bit uncomfortable. Shaking his head slightly, he left the bathroom in search of Penelope. He found her just outside of the bathroom, tapping her foot anxiously.

"_There _you are!" She said impatiently as she took in his disheveled appearance; for all the time he'd spent in the restroom, he didn't look much dryer than when he went in, but there was no _way _she was going to tell him that.

"May I remind you, Garcia, that it's largely your fault that I spent ten minutes drying my clothes under a puny hand drier? I _told _you I didn't want to get wet today!"

"I honestly didn't think it would be that bad, sir," she said, a bit sheepishly. "I thought that by sitting in the front seat, you'd avoid all of the side splashing. Who knew you would get it all in the front?"

Dave sighed, "How'd you stay so dry? You were sitting right behind me and it doesn't look like a single drop hit you."

"Um," she said, looking at the ground. "When I saw the wall of water coming towards us, I ducked behind you."

Dave just stared at her without saying anything…he did it for a minute or two until she finally got antsy under his glare. She finally had enough and she flashed him a sunny smile as she exclaimed, "Come on, we have to be at the 'small world' ride in," she quickly glanced at her neon pink Minnie Mouse watch, "Six minutes!" She grabbed his hand and pulled him along with her.

"We have appointments for rides now?" He asked as he tried to keep up; she was like a four year old on crack here. Earlier, when they'd first entered the park, she'd mentioned she was hungry so he bought her a soft pretzel that was shaped like a Mickey Mouse head and she nearly had a stroke when she saw it. She giggled with every bite she took and, despite himself, Dave found it to be very cute.

She nodded, "We have fast passes for _everything_!" She said happily. "My friend Justin works in the IT department, you met him earlier, remember?" Dave nodded. "Anyway, he arranged for us to get fast passes for _all _of the rides! Most people can only get them for one or two rides, but he got us passes for all of them! We'll be able to ride all day without waiting in the long lines!"

Dave's heart plummeted a little after hearing that; he'd counted on the long lines to keep them off of some of the rides he'd heard about, but thanks to her connections it looked like they were going to ride 'em all. "Garcia, can we _please _slow down?" He asked. He was in good shape but they'd been running around the park all morning and he was ready for a break. Unsurprisingly, he saw the back of her blonde head shake.

"We're almost there, sir, and then we'll be able to sit and relax," she told him.

"Really?" He asked suspiciously, "We're not going on a ride that's going to hurl me around in the dark? I'm not going to get soaked on this ride?" He caught up with her in time to see her cross her heart in a promise.

"I swear, Dave, this ride is mellow. All you have to do is sit back and relax."

"Finally," he huffed, looking forward to something simple.

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An hour later, Dave realized just how wrong the technical analyst had been about the ride. Instead of taking a leisurely ride through the seven seaways canal, the ride had gotten stuck five minutes into it. That wouldn't have been so bad if the operators would've turned off the godforsaken music, but no, _It's a Small World After All _played on a continuous loop for the entire forty-five minutes they were stuck there. By the end, Dave thought he would have a psychotic break and it was a damn good thing his wife had kept his sidearm at the hotel. He'd made a mental note to add the repeated playing of that song to the BAU's list of enhanced interrogation techniques; he was sure Jeffrey Dahmer himself would have confessed to all of his crimes after an hour of the song playing on a continuous loop!

"What are you going to get, sir?" Garcia asked as they perused the menus at the Hungry Bear Restaurant in the aptly named _Critter Land _part of the park.

"Cheeseburger and fries," he told her, hoping his wife hadn't recruited her in her campaign to get him to eat healthier. After the morning he'd had and the afternoon he was sure to have, he wanted his comfort food and God help the feisty woman if she tried to deny him of it. Thankfully, she didn't say anything about his food choice; she just kept staring at the menu intently.

Once the waitress reappeared to take their order, Dave gave his and Garcia put in her order of chicken tenders and fries. After that, they sat in a companionable silence, just watching the people around them.

After about five minutes, Dave let out a low whistle, "Check that kid out," he said, pointing to a five-year old. "That kid is going to be a serial killer before he's twenty."

Garcia stared at him in shock, "Did you just profile a child?" She asked in disbelief. "For God's sake, Rossi, the kid's what? Like five years old? How _dare _you label-" Her rant was cut off as the child in question flashed his three year old sister a menacing smile and then ripped the head off of her Minnie Mouse doll. As soon as his parents turned around, he schooled his expression into one of neutrality, but both of them saw the flash of evil behind his eyes.

"Okay," she said, swallowing hard, "You may have a point, but still! We're on a mini-vacation; no profiling," she declared firmly.

"Fine," Dave agreed grumpily.

Garcia's hip buzzed less than a minute later and she pulled her iPhone out of her pocket and began typing furiously. "No way," Dave said, plucking the device from her hands. "No technology."

The technical genius just stared at him in shock; _no one _dared touch her electronics, especially when she was using them! "Give me my phone back, Dave," she said threateningly, but to her surprise the older man shook his head and slipped the phone into his pocket.

"Nuh-uh," he said shaking his head. "If I'm forced to take a vacation from profiling, then _you _are going to take a vacation from the cyber world." He was talking tough, but Dave uneasily wondered if he was taking his life into his own hands by keeping her from her precious electronics. Thankfully, Garcia thought about it for a minute and then nodded.

At that moment, their mozzarella sticks arrived and they happily dug into the appetizer. "So how come you never went to Disneyland as a kid?" Dave asked as he dipped the deep fried cheese into some marinara sauce. "I know San Francisco is about a seven hour drive from here, but it's not like your family would've had to spend money on airline tickets."

"I know, but my parents…well, my parents were free spirits," Garcia told him, taking a stick of fried cheese. "They refused to work for any large corporations and they followed their own beat in life. Because of that, we didn't have much money while I was growing up. They actually managed to save enough money to take me after I graduated from high school, but then my dad lost his job and they had to use some of it just to pay the rent."

"How could they afford to send you to Cal-Tech?" Dave wondered.

Penelope smiled, "I got a full scholarship to the school and my parents couldn't have been prouder. Once dad got another job, they saved up again and they were going to take me during the summer after my first year of college," she told him and then paused for a minute. "They were killed five days before we were supposed to go," she said in a softer voice.

"Jesus, Garcia, I'm sorry," he said, sorry that he'd brought the subject up.

She gave him a sad smile, "Their funerals fell on the day of our trip. All I could think of when I was standing at the cemetery was that I was supposed to be at the happiest place on earth and instead I was at the saddest place." She looked down-trodden for a minute before she shook her head, as if to clear it. "But that was then and this is now and I'm having a _great _time here with you today!"

Before he could say anything, their food arrived and they both dug in, but Dave felt like a royal ass. All he'd done was bitch and moan all morning and he knew that the sparkly woman in front of him deserved more. He made a silent vow to be more agreeable and to follow her wherever she wanted to go.


End file.
